An Adventure
by Cabitha
Summary: It's time for our favorite couple to have a mystery of their own. Third genre horror, but only slightly. PM me plot suggestions!
1. Prologue

"Hey Jerome?" Mara whispered in the dark silence. There had been a power outage in the school, and most of the residents were "out" or "going for a walk" or "organizing a charity event to save the hedgehogs" Nina really was an awful liar. Jerome and Mara had been left alone in the house. Together.

Now, Jerome and Mara were not dating yet. They had just barely become friends in fact. But Jerome had found the secret stash of cookies, and Mara didn't like to be all alone in the dark in the house of Anubis. Jerome, for his part, didn't like being alone in the House of Anubis when there was an opportunity to be alone with Mara in the house.

"Yeah" He replied unsteadily.

"Where is everyone?" She popped another cookie in her mouth.

"Out." He said sarcastically "Taking a walk. Organizing a _charity event_." He scoffed.

"No, where are they?" She rolled her eyes. "All the time! They're always on a mysterious excursion." He smiled at her use of the word excursion, what a Mara thing to say.

Jerome couldn't explain it, now could he? That would destroy everything that the sibunas had worked for. But there were certain things that he could say, and those were the things that he did say.

"They're off, having an adventure aren't they?" He smiled and shoved another cookie in his mouth.

"Well, why do they get to have an adventure!" She giggled and threw her arms wide, "Why can't we have one too?"

Jerome smiled, Mara wasn't normally this…how to put this, giddy? It was like there were drugs in the cookies or something. Though clearly there wasn't. Maybe this was just Mara being happy, like really happy. He flattered himself that he was the reason that she was this way. But he knew that that probably wasn't the case.

"All right." He said "Let's have an adventure."


	2. In Which An Epiphany is Had

**Authors Note: This is basically my way of re-introducing myself to FF, I took a little break, and a lot has happened since then, so I might be a bit different now. Hope you don't mind. Wait, something in my house is making strange noises, I must investigate! Sorry, my cat was snoring. So some quick shout-outs;**

**JustKeepTyping and stuckbeingrachel: It was absolutely lovely to have you two be my first reviewers of this story, you guys are the best, though you were both spectacularly unhelpful when it came to plot suggestions, just kidding, you guys are amazing.**

**Also to my friend Horsegirl275, you guys should read her stories, because she deserves it and I have spent so much time badgering her to post that I really want her stories to do well! Sorry, that was kind of spammy but oh well.**

**iluvhoa123**** and ****OnTheBrinkOfInsanity****: Nice to see your names again. Thanks for reviewing! I love how I recognize my reviewers now, it's really nice.**

**Theboyandgirlwhowaited: Your penname, is possibly the best thing on the planet, of all time, ever. What's Clara or Oswin or whoever she is going to be called? I heard she was going to be The Woman Who Died Twice Over, but Rory died way more than she did.**

**Just to be clear, I won't be doing this every chapter, I just felt like it today.**

**Disclaimer: Peddie broke up in season three, if I owned HOA, I would be killing the screenwriters right now.**

Adventures. It was a strange word, and the more Jerome repeated it in his mind, the stranger it seemed to sound. Would it sound better if he emphasized the 'a'? He wondered. Perhaps his pronunciation of the 'vent' is what did it. He hung his head in his hands. He had promised Mara an adventure, and all he could think about was the way the word was pronounced, was it any wonder that she wasn't dating him?

Anubis house had it's fair share of adventures, this Jerome knew well. But he had promised Mara her own, personal adventure story. Mara might have thought he was joking that night, but he wasn't. There had to be something, not some adult, 'go get a job and watch it pay off' sort of adventure. A real, honest to goodness, adventure, (again he wondered, perhaps the 'ure' in his pronunciation of the word was off, maybe that needed to be emphasized?) And the thing was, the past years had shown him that these adventures existed, well and truly existed, and more than that, they were nearby.

Jerome had his own adventures sometimes, what with his dad and the jewel, spying for Rufus, and his pranking. But Mara needed a Mara tailored adventure. Something. There had to be something.

Jerome knew that the adventures of the house were pretty much SIBUNA's domain, and silly as it may sound, he didn't want to encroach on their territory. He had already lost Alfie's trust, he didn't want to make it any worse for them. And even if Nina had left, that Scooby gang wouldn't stop, and with KT and that Willow girl, their hands were probably full.

So the house was out of bounds, in this absurd game that he had begun to play. That left the woods and the school. Jerome knew that one couldn't just ask for an adventure to appear, there had to be some sort of first move, as though the elusive adventure he searched for was the entity playing the white pieces in some insane version of chess.

So Jerome thought to himself, he wondered if there had been any sort of hint at an adventure, anything at all that had happened to him that seemed at all mysterious? He thought of the woods and the school. But everything that came up was somehow SIBUNA related. The clearing in the woods? SIBUNA. The Frobisher-Smythe library? SIBUNA. The history classroom? Now he was just being ridiculous.

He shook his head and pulled his red blazer over his shoulders, he wouldn't normally wear it, but it was cold. He walked, no, he sauntered down the hall to the dining room. Determined to keep up his façade of cold indifference. He nodded to Alfie as he passed. They had done a prank on the football jocks last week and they had bonded again. But their friendship had it's limits now, and different infinities, as he preferred to call them. It seemed that they had opened the door to talking about other people, relationships, gossip, who to prank, how and why to prank them. They also had the same things in common as they always had, troubled home-lives, unrequited infatuation, a love of horror movies and aliens. But they had shut the door on the mystery, and on their respective relationships with the SIBUNAS.

He saw Mara reading on the couch, he deduced from the length and age of the book that it was her favorite, The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. It occurred to him that had Mara been born a little later in July, she would have made a great Chosen One.

Jerome placed himself, with the catlike grace that only he possessed, on the couch next to her. He could see that she hadn't noticed. He smiled and pushed a little closer. Ah, now she noticed. But she mad no indication that she wished him to leave, and so he pushed a little closer, and he gently put his hand on hers to lower the book so that they could share. She indulged this, though she quickly turned the page before she had finished. She wasn't going to wait up for him, that was for sure. He smiled again, that was fine. Jerome had started somewhere in the middle of a great action scene, and he couldn't really tell what was going on, or who he should be rooting for, other than Sherlock and Watson. Was the Scotland Yard on the side of Holmes? Because they were trading enough insults that it seemed that they were enemies.

At one point, one of the characters snuck down into an abandoned tunnel, and while Mara was reading Sherlock's deductions with her rapidly moving eyes, Jerome had stopped, and was thinking about the tunnels that he knew existed in the house. The tunnel down to the cellar, the tunnel from the library to the Mask. If there were that many tunnels in the house and in the library, why had there been no tunnels in the school? Or under the woods?

And Jerome remembered vividly, when Alfie and him had played a prank on Ms. Andrews, how they had run and hid in a storage closet, but he remembered that the storage closet had been in between two identical classrooms (room 112 and 113 if you were wondering) and how he had been in both those classrooms, and he knew that the two classrooms hadn't quite met up the way they should've, and the closet was far too short to have made up that extra space. He was grinning now, because he also remembered how there was a top floor to the school, and how, strangely enough, the only door that anyone could ever find that was locked, seemed to be in the perfect place to be a stairwell up to the…top floor. Interesting.

"Jerome?" Mara asked worriedly,

"Mara, you know I love you, but you are interrupting my epiphany." He grinned down at her. She laughed,

"What's this about an epiphany?" Two voices called down from above and behind them. Jerome and Mara started, looking back and seeing Alfie and Patricia watching them.

"My epiphany…" Jerome said grandly, sweeping his arms wide, " My epiphany, has absolutely nothing to do with either of you two!" But he leaned down and whispered in Mara's ear,

"But it has everything to do with our adventure." He winked.

"You were serious about that?" Mara said disbelievingly,

"Oh Mara, when have I ever lied to you?" Mara opened her mouth to say that he had lied to her loads of times, that he had lied about his past and his reasons for being gone so often, but as she looked at him, so impishly cheerful, she couldn't bring him down like this. She couldn't ever have told him off when he looked so genuinely happy.

"I'm looking forward to the adventure then Jerome." She said calmly, but somehow, when he leaned over further and kissed her cheek, whispering, " It will be amazing." Her stomach seemed to clench, not in an unpleasant way, and he cheek felt different from the rest of her face, as though it had suddenly regained the feeling of giddiness that she had felt so overwhelmingly the night before.


	3. In Which The Adventure Begins

**Hello again, my fellow earthlings! A new chapter for thee! ****Do you like my disclaimer, because I am pretty frickin' proud of it.**

**Disclaimer:**

**Oh, I wish I owned HOA,**

**So people may think me smart,**

**Oh, how I wish I owned HOA,**

**So people would know I am a romantic at heart,**

**But alas, I don't own it,**

**I write a fanfic **

**That's all I did with my time**

**Oh, how I wish I owned House Of Anubis**

**So I may inherit their writers sense of rhyme!**

Jerome had a special sense of agility. I described it before as a cat-like grace, but I feel that that is not quite the proper word. Every movement he made had purpose, even when he hid against the wall like a spy, it didn't look ridiculous because it looked as though he had a purpose for every corny move. He was known for sneaking up on people, known for being that breath on the back of your neck, that omnipresent shadow that follows you when you are getting up to some mischief. Everything about him was enigmatic; how could his eyes be that shade of blue? Those shades of blue that sucks you in and makes you stare long enough for him to see and make some snide comment. How could his hair stay in that perfect flip? Just enough that the fringe hung over his eyes, casting a shadow. And he was tall, too tall. Just tall enough to be intimidating when he chose to be.

But all of these things didn't mean that he wasn't a teenage boy, with raging hormones and moments of awkwardness. They didn't mean that he never made mistakes with girls or that sometimes his 'intimidating' lines came off a bit comical. Jerome also experienced fear as much as the next person, sneaking into a storage closet and tapping around, hoping to god that the janitor didn't decide to pay him a visit; well, he couldn't pretend it didn't make his heart go a little faster.

He hoped Mara would have this feeling, that she would feel the adrenaline and energy that one would have to force down so as not to get caught doing something naughty. He paused for a moment in his tapping of the wall, naughty? He wondered, why did he choose that word to describe an experience she would have in a storage closet? That wasn't what he meant at all, something against the rules and would make her excited. Oh my god, why couldn't he phrase this in a way that wouldn't sound so dirty! That wasn't what he thought of Mara!

Midway through his guilty rant, he heard something, the sound of success. An echo behind the panel, perfect, he mused. He examined the panel, it was dark wood and there was nothing to suggest that it wasn't part of the wall, no door, no hole for an eye-shaped locket, nothing. It looked for all the world to be an unassuming wooden board. How to get in then? He examined the edges carefully; there was nothing to pull. He took a step back, trying to get a bigger picture.

Idiot.

The panel was an especially thin piece of wood, ringed by a wider piece of wood on all sides. The hollow was as small as the middle board, but the door was almost the size of a whole wall. And on one side of it, one glorious and humiliating side, there was a lock.

Idiot, he repeated.

The lock was old, really old, and covered in rust and a fine layer of dust, the keyhole looked simple, he could use it as a peephole if there wasn't a wall behind it. Jerome knew how to pick locks; it was a skill one must pick up quickly if they wanted to be the prankster king.

Well if this was to be a Mara adventure, he would need a Mara. The trouble was that Jerome didn't know if the tunnel would be an adventure, perhaps it would only end up being a service tunnel, or some demented sewer. He nixed the sewer idea, but it still could be dangerous, and it still could turn out to be incredibly boring. He wouldn't know until he went in, and if he went in without Mara, he might ruin her fun.

Jerome also took this moment to remember how dangerous adventures could be, what if he was leading her into a SIBUNA or Society of the Teachers trap? What if something fell, or the tunnel was simply unsafe. What if Mara was too scared to go? He nixed that idea as well, bookish and shy as she might be, Mara Jaffrey was not a wimp. And here was what decided him, Mara was not a wimp, and she was not a child, he would not enter the passage until she was with him, and if he was wrong and the passage turned out to be a non-event, she would be able to take it like a big girl.

He roamed the halls as casually as he could, trying not to look like he was up to something, which as we all know, makes you look like you're up to something, the corridors were packed, and it was slow going. He eventually found Mara chatting with Patricia and Eddie in the student lounge. They looked at him suspiciously when he pulled her away.

"Remember my promise?" He asked mischievously.

"I remember…" she whispered.

"Well, meet me outside 112, tonight-" He cut her off, "Yes, I know we're not allowed, but what's life without a little risk? Meet me outside of 112 tonight, at eight, okay?" she nodded, looking unsure. Jerome felt bad almost, he didn't mean to cause her this much stress.

"See you there!" She said with a false brightness to her voice.

"Hey, Mara?" Jerome put his hand on her shoulder, "I won't do anything bad, this isn't a prank, I swear." Mara nodded,

"That wasn't what I was worried about."

* * *

They met as promised, both dressed warmly, Mara wearing a big red coat that Jerome couldn't help but notice brought out a lovely green sparkle in her eyes. They had come equipped with flashlights and duct tape—Jerome's secret weapon of choice—water guns, in case they ran into the wicked witch of the west, some sandwiches and a blanket. It may have looked to an outsider that they were preparing for a romantic picnic, in a closet.

He led her in, pointing out the lock and the panel that was hollow. Mara didn't even blink before pulling a bobby pin out of her night time braid. Jerome was surprised, but impressed, his hands shook as he opened the lock and they peered into the darkness. Their flashlights (torches, they call them.) revealed a long tunnel, forking tunnel. Jerome hesitated, about to say jokingly "Ladies first?" But Mara didn't give him a chance, clambering through in an instant,

"Jeez Jerome, hurry up, we're burnin' daylight!" She grinned, and Jerome laughed,

"We are prone to underestimating you, Mara, aren't we?"

"This. Is. An. Adventure, hurry up!" she said seriously. Jerome couldn't help but notice that the word adventure sounded perfect when she said it.


	4. In Which Cats Are Discovered

**Hello everyone! So, the best way for me to be motivated to write a chapter is to have finals the next week and use FF writing to procrastinate. AHH, Finals! I'm gonna die!**

**Also, I wanted to know, sometimes I like to swear (don't tell my parents) But I have been avoiding it in this story. Do you find it offensive? Do you mind? I promise I'm not going to swear every other word, but sometimes I think it adds dramatic effect. But if you do find it offensive, tell me why, do you find certain words more offensive than others? If so, what words do you think I can use? Do you not care at all? Tell me in the reviews!**

**So, a brief explanation of the more obscure names in the story, Hobbes was an English philosopher, Daisy is a character in Great Gatsby, Gary the snail is in spongebob ( But really it was just a name that sounded like Jerome) Oh, and schrodinger was a guy who proved a point in science by putting a cat in a box and exposing it to tons of radiation to see if it would kill the cat. DOES NO ONE ELSE THINK THAT'S HORRIBLE?**

**Disclaimer: Still no.**

* * *

The passageway that Jerome had discovered was dark and dank. The walls were lined with rusty pipes and the floor was covered in small bones and broken glass. Their flashlights brought light into the tunnel, but it was so long that even when they shined their lights straight ahead, they only hit more blackness. The ceiling seemed to be sloping downward, which worried both Jerome and Mara greatly.

"So, adventure..." Mara said sarcastically. Jerome smiled,  
"Shut up, if it wasn't for this you would be slaving away over that English assignment that isn't due for four months."

Mara slowed her pace so that she was walking next to him. She linked her arm with his and rested her head on his shoulder, slowly looking up at him with her big brown eyes. God, those eyes. Jerome stopped walking.

"And what would you be doing if it wasn't for this?" Mara asked innocently. Jerome gulped, daydreaming about you, he thought.

"I would be helping Alfie with a prank that is going to flop without me." She laughed.

"You are so full of it, what makes you think he wouldn't be able to handle it?" Jerome leaned over,

"It involves Patricia and Eddie." Mara brought her hand up to her lips in surprise, "in fact," he continued, "it's more of a public service, helping them out with their problem." Mara shushed him,

"She is my friend, and if I hear any more of this I will be obligated to tell her." Jerome smiled and nodded,

"Shall we continue on then?" She nodded and they started walking again, but neither of them un-linked their arms. In a dark and scary tunnel, would you release that comfort?

They continued on for a long time, both were very aware of the fact that it was getting a lot later in the evening than when they left. The ceiling was getting lower as well, so much so that Jerome had to duck his head. Mara didn't really have to worry about that.

They finally came upon a door, small and made of iron, and locked with a padlock. And a bolt. And a keyhole. And boarded over. They both sighed and untangled themselves from each other. Jerome set about picking the locks and breaking what he could. Mara explored the wall around it.

"Oh, Jerome come look!" She said excitedly. Mara had found a small indent in the wall, and in it, a large black cat and her seven children lay comfortably. Jerome looked over and smiled. He loved cats. They were sneaky and graceful and did everything for their own personal gain, unless they really, really loved somebody.

"Can I name them?" She asked happily.  
"Yeah, sure." Jerome said giggled.  
"That one," She pointed at the mother, "Is going to be called Schrodinger," She began.  
"Wait! First of all Schrodinger was a guy, and why would you want to name a cat after a guy who put a cat in a box to expose it to crazy radiation?" Mara glared,

"That one is going to be called Schrodinger." She said sternly, "And that one," She pointed towards what seemed to be the most dominant kitten, a slightly orange one with a black nose, "Is going to be Hobbes." She continued to name the rest of the cats: Daisy, after Daisy Buchanon, Holden, after Holden Caulfield, Gary, after Gary the snail, Emma, after the character in Emma, by Jane Austin, Charlotte, after Charlotte Bronte-Jerome stopped her there, asking politely if he could name the last one.

The last one was a small dark kitten, whose face looked very serious, even as it rolled around on the floor to scratch it's back. It was clearly the youngest and the runt, and Jerome could tell from his volunteer hours at the animal shelter that it wasn't going to get much bigger (Jerome, volunteer? You say, but he needed sixty hours to graduate, and like I said before, he liked cats)

"Can we name this one Mary?" Mara smiled, "Yeah, any reason?" Jerome coughed, after you of course, he thought to himself, but he said,  
"After Mary Shelley, author of Frankenstein." Mara nodded, though she looked a little put out. The cats were named, but it wasn't as though the two were planning on doing anything with them, they knew if they so much as breathed on the kittens the Schrodinger would go berserk. Mara brought up the idea that they should bring them to the local animal shelter, but Jerome had spent a lot of time there, and he knew that it had plenty of cats already. And he also believed that the cats could survive down here, and he thought that they deserved their freedom from pesky owners who would might de-claw them or something similar.

They returned to the door, Jerome picked the padlock and the keyhole, bu the bolt and the boards were a little more tricky. Mara and Jerome worked together to pry the boards off the door, but they were nailed on tight, and even with their age, the boards were strong.

"Alright, I'll grab this end, you grab that end, and we'll pull as hard as we can on three." Mara nodded,

"1, 2, 3!" The nails pulled out slightly, but not completely.

"Again, 1, 2, 3!" The nails pulled a little more, and the wood groaned.

"One last time," Jerome grunted, "1, 2, 3!" The board came loose, but the force that they had used to pull it off was too much, and both of them fell backwards. They would have landed next to each other, if Jerome hadn't tried to catch Mara as they were falling. As such, they landed in a sort of X form, with Mara on top and the board bouncing off her arm.

They got up and dusted themselves off, blushing. They examined the door, all that was left to crack was the deadbolt. There was no keyhole, they needed a code. Jerome sighed,

"I have a kit for this at home." Mara stared at him, he had a lock-picking kit? At his house or at Anubis?

"Don't look at me like that, my dad's in jail, I might have learned a few things. Anyway, we should come back to this tomorrow, I think you need some ice, and we need to get back before curfew, which is in..." He pulled out an old pocket watch with the initials JC inscribed on the back, "In five minutes..." they looked at each other,

"We better run." Mara said quietly, Jerome nodded, "Yeah." Neither of them moved. " We better run." Mara repeated. Jerome nodded again, "Yeah." They looked at the still ticking watch.

"Holy crap we have four minutes!" Mara yelled, and they ran like the devil was chasing them.

* * *

They raced down the tunnel and out of the closet door, Jerome barely managed to move a shelf in front of the entrance. They ran out of the school and down the path back to the house. They could hear the end of Victor's speech,

"-I want to hear a pin! Drop..." There was a deathly silence as Jerome lead Mara in though the back door, and she raced up the stairs, Jerome made his way to his room silently. Victor stopped Mara at the top of the stairs.

"Why are you running, and why are you not in bed?" He asked sternly.  
"Because dear Victor, I was dealing with some feminine issues in the downstairs bathroom, you can't rush these things you know." she said loudly. Her smile widened as Victor slowly turned pink.

"Ahem, well off to bed then." And Mara walked with the proud bearing of a queen as the house cracked up silently in their rooms.

* * *

"Where have you been?" Her roommates chorused in whispers.

"On a date with Schrodinger's cats."


	5. In Which People Fall

**AHHH! Hello. So I had this moment where I was searching for my story in the JARA fanfics, and then I realized that the links weren't all purple anymore, I feel really bad.**

**Oh, and the general consensus on the swearing was that people were okay with it as long as there wasn't too much and no offensive to women words (Trust me stuckbeingrachel, I find the B-word and the C-word (not crap) to be super offensive and would only use them if I was making a super jerk character) So that's good.**

**Oh, and I went to a museum and saw a painting by Monet. MY LIFE. I just, I can't. AHHH!**

**Disclaimer: All my disclaimer awesomeness went into the last one so…I don't own it.**

They didn't understand the crosshatches on the walls.

Jerome and Mara were back, and after a quick cooing over Schrodinger and her kittens, Jerome had picked the combination lock.

The room was small; about ten by ten feet, five and a half high, there was a hole in the corner which stank up to high heaven. There was a thin board leaning against the wall, and a small rectangle of space next to the door that they hadn't noticed when they were outside.

And then there were the crosshatches. You know the way that you tally up points, or the amount of times you won this or that game? IIII with a diagonal fifth line that crosses all the others? There were hundreds, if not thousands of them, carved into every wall and even a few on the floor. The marks on the wall were so close together that it was hard to tell one group from the next.

"Oh," They had spent enough time in prison to know what this room was.

"Why would someone be held in a school?" Mara whispered. Jerome thought about Rufus, and Sarah, and Victor's crazy father that he knew was supposed to have done terrible things to all who got in his way.

"I don't know," He said softly, "What I want to know is how he managed to carve into the wall, I doubt he had a knife."

Mara was shivering, it hadn't been all that cold before. Jerome was busy examining the carvings, but her teeth were chattering loudly. For some reason, she was suddenly more uneasy, the hatches on the wall were suddenly more eerie and the general feeling more gray.

She was cold, she was too cold, so cold that it was burning her skin. And colors seemed to appear out of nowhere, focusing around Jerome and the tally marks.

"Jerome," She said weakly. She could see something was there, changing things, something was appearing on the wall that wasn't there before. A door. Mara shook her head, there was not a door there before. Jerome was next to her now, holding her waist. It was a touch that she was unused to, but not uncomfortable with. The door was metal and solid, but clearly unlocked.

Mara was shivering and faint. Mara was scared and unsure. But Mara was first through the door anyway.

The next tunnel that they entered was wide, with illogically high ceilings. The walls were dirty and the floor coated with dust. At the end of the tunnel there was a web of boards.

When I say a web of boards, I mean that there was a five by five square of wooden boards that went up to and it seemed beyond the ceiling. The boards crisscrossed each other and some were thin and some were thick, some had nails in them and some looked as though they would break at a butterfly's touch.

Mara wasn't cold anymore.

They made their way up to the web cautiously. Touching the boards carefully and exchanging many calculating looks,

"Well, what else have we got to do?" Jerome said weakly. It was about ten AM, they had woken up bright and early that morning to go explore. They found an opening wide enough to slip though and began to climb. Jerome went ahead of Mara, insisting that his manliness level would sink if he didn't.

There were spiders and creepy-crawly bugs that neither of them were thrilled about, contorting their bodies like Professor Lockhart had just removed their bones was not pleasant, but still they trekked on. Weaving in and out of the openings until they reached a relatively clear spot to stop and rest.

"God, we have got to take a shower when we get home," Mara panted. Jerome ran his hands through his dusty and sweaty hair,

"I'd have to agree with you there. But don't pretend you don't find this sooo attractive…" He winked at her. Mara was unused to this joke-flirt thing he was doing but she definitely liked it.

"Oh yeah, I've got a thing for dust-covered, sweaty, tall guys." She grinned.

"Well you know, I've got a thing for dust-covered, sweaty, beautiful girls!" He laughed, but the joke had gotten more serious now, beautiful; a word that girls pray for. A guy can call you breath-taking, stunning, gorgeous, but nothing comes close to beautiful. Mara didn't know how to proceed in the conversation, she could call him handsome, which would not be a lie, she could call him attractive, which was also the truth, but she knew that she could call him nothing that would express to him that she found him beautiful, in a guy way.

Perhaps it is unfair that guys don't get a word for that, but they also don't get a word for slut, so perhaps that evened out.

Eventually the pause got too long for her to make any kind of joke so they continued their climb. This time Mara in front, her being the faster climber from years rock-climbing with her parents.

Jerome had just noticed another tally mark next to him when she fell.


	6. In Which A New Problem Comes To Light

Jerome had just noticed the hatch on the wall when Mara fell. I put it a bit wrongly before, Jerome had not noticed the tally mark, he had noticed it appear. He saw the wall slowly push in and make the symbol.

But Mara was falling, so Jerome didn't have time to think about that. The boards in the web were close together, so she wasn't falling any great distance, but the boards were fragile after all these years, and some of them broke underneath her. She slipped and fell backwards on a particularly fragile board and it broke, the broken board cut her abdomen and she twisted her wrist as she tried to slow her fall. She lay there for a moment, breathing loudly.

Jerome was climbing at the speed of light, thinking that even if she had stopped falling, he could still catch her. He reached her quickly,

"Mara, oh my god, Mara!" He wrung his hands in worry.

"It's okay Jerome, I'm fine," she said weakly. Jerome put his head in his hands thanking anything that could possibly have been the thing that saved her a thousand times over.

"Mara, we should go back to the house, get you cleaned up."

"No, we need to keep going!" She said stubbornly, trying to raise herself on her sprained wrist and failing miserably.

Jerome looked at her, really looked at her. He rarely had that luxury, to be able to openly stare at her. He took in her tired eyes, the blood that was escaping her cut stomach, and the bruises that were already beginning to form.

"No," he said quietly, but his voice allowed no room for disagreement. He had only said no to the idea that they keep going, but in his mind he was saying no to the entire thing. There was too much danger, and he would not allow her to be brought into it. This was why he was constantly scared for Alfie, and why he had left when he did, he didn't want to bring anyone else into this creepy supernatural world. And he would not allow Mara to be brought into it.

he lifted her up gently, by her waist, and together they carefully maneuvered their way out of the web. They said goodbye to Schrodinger and her kittens, and they walked out of the tunnel slowly, Jerome stopping the flow of blood from her stomach and in doing so, he found a great excuse to stay very close to her.

Jerome made sure that the door was hidden very well.

At the house

Jerome had found the first aid kit and was carefully finishing all the bandaging and icing that needed to be done.

"You don't want to go back, do you?" Mara asked seriously. Jerome looked up at her that was not, technically speaking, what he meant. He wanted to go back, he didn't want her to go back

"I think we didn't know what we were getting ourselves into, with the adventure and all that."

"So you'll just leave then? You'll leave the cats and the tally marks on the wall and just forget about them?" Mara asked incredulously.

Jerome thought about all the things that he had forced himself to forget over the years. His father, Rufus, Poppy, that overwhelming feeling that something was going on with his mother and her assistant Marc, he thought about how he had forced himself into SIBUNA and how he had forced himself out. Jerome had experience with forgetting.

"No, you'll go back and force me to stay here," she realized. Jerome said nothing and Mara started to laugh.

"What's so funny?" He asked self-consciously.

"THIS ISN"T THE 1800'S! YOU THINK YOU CAN STOP ME FROM DOING ANYTHING?" She screamed in her laughter. Jerome looked down at the ground in shame and Mara felt a bit bad for her outburst. She put her hand on Jerome's face, stoking his cheek.

"Jerome, I'm sorry. I'm sorry for laughing, but you can't stop me from doing anything. Even if it's dangerous, because I am my own person and you don't own me. And I'm flattered that you care so much," she took a breath, " But you can't give me an adventure and then expect me to give it up because you asked me to."

"No, I guess I was just praying you would listen to reason." He said sullenly, but there was a smile in his eyes.

Mara's hand was still on his face, and Jerome let that feeling sink in. He was observing her eyes, and the lovely, rich brown that they were. She was beautiful, in her nerdy and brave moments, she was really beautiful.

She slowly took her hand away from his cheek, as if the action pained her, but she was done with this romantic, awkward sappy crap.

"Ahem," She began, " I think as long as I can't move my wrist we should focus on research," Jerome rolled his eyes and she smiled, "I'll do most of it, but we should probably know what it is that we're dealing with, don't you agree?" He nodded and began to move out of the room. But he felt as though he needed a more dramatic exit, he ran back towards Mara and kissed her lightly on the cheek, and when he pulled away, and they were close, he said,

"To be honest, I was kind of hoping you would disagree with me."


	7. In Which Walls Are Shattered

**Okay, so sort of a fluff chapter, loosely based on life events, I swear that the next chapter will be longer and more interesting. Sorry it took me so long, Life's been a bit complicated. This chapter is dedicated to OnTheBrinkOfInsanity, sometimes people just leave the sweetest reviews that just brighten up my day. Yours was one of them.**

**Also, I had the scariest dream, Mara and Jerome broke up and she was trapped and neither of them cared about eachother and it was so TERRIBLE! Also, I'm a bit behind, but I keep seeing all this Willome stuff, has there been some sort of Willome in the show that I missed? Will someone explain?**

**Also, the plot ideas thing still stands, please PM me!**

Research, even to the most studious of people, was boring. Mara was a thorough, meticulous person, but after page after page of false leads and bad answers, she was getting frustrated.

Mara had bandages on her body, and had been ordered by Jerome to stay in her room, preferably on her bed and not strain herself. Mara didn't have much of a problem with this, but it made for some awkward situations.

The computer lay in her lap and glowed as brightly as the moon, Jerome sat next to her, a careful six inches away next to her, his computer in his lap. His hair flipped over his eyes and you would think that he would have a hard time seeing. But he didn't. She could see his bright blue eyes looking intensely at the screen through the fringe. He was far away.

It felt as though there was a glass wall between them, a wall that they were slowly hacking away, but it should shatter. If there was any good in the world, it would shatter. All their touches were small and not awkward, but always…unusual.

To be honest, it scared her.

She remembered the feeling as he lead her out through the tunnel, how he had kept his hand on her waist. She had read books that said that your true love's touch will feel like electricity. That small sparks of lightning would spread out through their fingerpads and slowly start coursing through your body. She had heard of fireworks.

But Jerome didn't feel like fireworks. Jerome felt like an honest, caring, brush of the hand. He felt like comfort of a friend who cared a little bit more than a normal person. She hoped she wasn't imagining the last part.

But they never touched. It barely happened, and when it did, Jerome was scared of putting emotion into it. She remembered when she had hugged him the first time. How she had put her arms around him and snuggled into his chest. He had wrapped tentative arms around her, and when she said she might cry, he told her not too.

She wanted this _damn_ glass wall to shatter.

She snuck another look at his eyes. They were piercing blue, as they were the day before, and the day before, and the day before that. So why did she keep feeling the need to check?

Mara moved a bit closer to him, very slowly. She leaned her head against the bed board and pressed her head back. Then, slowly, very slowly, she slid her head down to his shoulder. Neither of them said anything.

Mara didn't feel as though lightning bolts were shooting through her head. But she felt like she wasn't alone.

They stayed like that for a while. A long while. Jerome leaned his head on top of hers. They were like that when Trudy called them to supper, and when they sat down, they let their legs touch.


	8. In Which Skipping Takes Place

**I don't really know what to say. I haven't been watching. I'M SORRY, I COULDN'T HANDLE THE WILLOME, and the not-Peddie. Basically, until season three ends and it ends with JARA and Peddie satisfied, Cabitha no watchie. But if anyone wants to tell me when an adorable JARA moment happens, that'll be great!**

**I'm also sorry that I haven't been writing, school's been really stressful, I did backstage stuff for a play and there just hasn't really been time.**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing, obviously.**

They were back to the web, ready for a second attempt, they took it slowly, Jerome staying as close to Mara as he could. He was scared for her and of her he realized. She was headstrong and confident in her own way, and he hoped that her strength would not cause another fall.

The boards were brown and crackly, and whenever they creaked under Mara and Jerome's weight, the two would search for the other's hand. Jerome made Mara stop and rest at the place where her had been when she fell, he searched for the hatch mark as subtly as he could, and, finding nothing, agreed to resume the climb.

At the top of the web was a black square of an opening.

"Eh, erm, I'll go first?" Jerome said half-heartedly. Mara looked him in the eye, chocolate and ice. She placed her arm on his in a comforting way. Jerome had never believed in the shots of electricity idea, but the feeling he got when she placed her hand on his arm was like an injection of calm bravery. It spread through his body like venom from a snake, energizing every muscle. He smiled at her and pulled himself through.

Jerome pointed his flashlight across the narrow room, it was a hallway he realized and it had light bulbs hanging from the ceiling! He pulled himself all the way in, he turned around to help Mara up.

"Woah…" She said, and smiled at him.

The walls were once bright white, but age and rust had taken over, and they had dimmed to a dusty brown. Jerome and Mara scanned the walls for a light switch. They found one, but most of the bulbs had burned out, so the few that remained cast a dim, spooky atmosphere.

Logic and reason told them both to be scared, they were literally walking through a horror movie, but they weren't scared. They each felt strong and powerful. They were the first to be here in years.

They felt bold. Mara moved her hand to brush her fingers against Jerome's, he wrapped his hand around hers. This could have been a beautiful, emotional moment, but then they looked forwards, Jerome shined his flashlight into the dark, they looked at eachother and nodded.

They started skipping.

They skipped as far as they could manage, never turning on to a new hallway in case they got lost. They collapsed on the ground when they couldn't breathe, laughing.

"Phew, ok, let's walk now." Mara grinned.

Jerome couldn't make his mouth work. Against the dingy walls and in the flickering lights, her face shone in a way that he had never seen before, lights were dancing in her brown eyes and her hair was loose and bouncy, creating a dark, frizzy halo around her face. She was beautiful, really beautiful. He couldn't think of a single person more beautiful than Mara Jaffray.

Mara was looking at him a little strangely, his lips were slightly parted and he was completely entranced by her. He was sure that he looked positively idiotic, but there was no hope for it. He nodded and jerked his head away.

They walked on in silence. At the end of the hallway was a door with a childish sign saying, "Celia aNd Rufus' RooM" clearly done in finger paint. The handle was rusty and chained shut, but it was falling to bits so much that all they had to do was yank it.


	9. In Which Cabitha Can't Think Of A Title

**Hey it's me. So there are some things I'd like to say, first things first:**

**Joyrome/Willome shippers. DIE.**

**Moving on:**

**Give it to me straight, is Jara ever getting back together?**

**If there are any cute JARA moments, please tell me so that I can search them.**

**I don't really know how I feel about this chapter, is it too horror movie? Are the characters realistic? I haven't written much for this fic in a while so I'm not sure.**

**Oh, and if any of my friends IRL are reading this, would you guys be so kind as to review so that I can know? Like le Goat or le Sarcastic Drummer or le Drarry Shipper? BC I haven't heard from you guys for a while, where you at?**

**TO everyone else, HELLO! How've you been?**

**Disclaimer: OI, If I owned HOA, I would make it so that I could watch it, AKA NO ET/WILLOME/JOYROME.**

They pulled the rusty chain halfheartedly and it crumbled. Jerome looked at Mara in fear, he knew where this was leading, but he also knew that he couldn't talk her out of it. He was just so glad that Rufus was dead. They pushed the door slowly.

What they saw was terrifying.

The walls were painted on with red paint, clearly with the same fingerpaint style as the sign on the door, there were two beds and a writing desk, on the wall opposite the desk there was a complete chemistry set with a chair sitting next to it. The chair had scratches running up and down the sides. One of the beds had been stripped of everything except the frame, while the other had all the fittings of a child's bed with the covers thrown back, creating the eerie effect of someone who had just left, but it was so matted with dust that it was clear that they hadn't come back.

Jerome was petrified, the comforter on the bed had cars on it, and the pillowcases were green with dinosaurs. It looked like his room when he was five, in fact, because he so rarely went home, the room might still look like that. Mara thrust her arm across his waist and pulled him out of the room, shutting the door behind them.

She forced him to sit down, leaning his back against the wall.

"Jerome! Jerome it's okay, c'mon, look at me." He was looking at her, or at least in her direction, but it was clear that he wasn't seeing her. She smoothed his hair back away from his face in a nervous way. He was almost catatonic.

Jerome was thinking and remembering. He remembered the bright blue eyes of Rufus, and the way he had had no mercy on anyone he encountered. Celia. Celia. Celia. That must have been his sister. His sister had slept in the bed that was gone. They had been locked in, or perhaps Rufus had locked the door behind him. Why? Why? He was just a kid, they were all just kids!

Mara was sliding her small hands under his arms, lifting him up as gently as she could. She pushed him forward and he walked like a zombie. She felt bile rise in her throat, what was this? Why was he like this? Would he ever be the same?

They walked down the tunnel, but Mara knew that until Jerome had regained some control, it wouldn't be safe for them to go back down the web. She lay him on the ground, he was putty in her hands.

He was breathing, and his heart was beating, but he may as well have been dead. Mara had tears in her eyes, how could she comfort him when she didn't understand to the depth that he did? What could she possibly do?

She ran her hand over his cheek again. This time she let it run down to his chest. Then she lay next to him, her hand on his chest, the only way she could tell that he was alive was through the constant and rhythmic beating of his heart. She let tears fall.

It was so fun. They had been skipping and naming cats. What was going on? How could this happen, they were feeling bold and brave, how swiftly could the universe take that away from them?

She lay there and cried, with him and for him and waited.

Jerome took his time coming to. First he noticed the hand on his chest, and curiosity gave him the strength to turn his head and look at Mara. He realized that his remembering had made him hurt her, scare her, confuse her. None of it was her fault, she was just there, trying to help. He dimly remembered her forcing him to walk. He sent energy to his body and sat up, he brought his arms around her and held her so close that he worried that she couldn't breathe.

"Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry."

He repeated until the word ceased to have meaning. Until it was a comforting nonsense. He forced himself to move on from the room, from the things he was thinking about Rufus and himself. Be here, be now. They both calmed down, though they didn't discuss what had happened.

They made their way out the hall, down the web, through the room and out the tunnel, locking the door behind them.

Mara was smart. This was an undeniable fact, but patience was not amongst her virtues. She dragged Jerome to a small clearing in the woods, a place that was normally private for her but she knew that Jerome had found it already.

It was an old apple tree with a log underneath and in a plastic bag she kept her favorite books. But this was not the time for such trivial pursuits.

Somehow, in the time that it had taken for Mara and Jerome to reach The Apple Tree, Mara had gotten mad. Really, really mad. And it wasn't specifically directed at Jerome, but she was angry that throughout all of this, he hadn't told her what had happened. And he had scared her, she hadn't known what was going on, he had just gone silent.

"Alright, I've given you time, now for god's sake, tell me what just happened." Mara was a mess. Her hair was wild about her face, and her clothing was ragged and dusty from their sojourn into the tunnels. She was livid. But what made her truly terrifying was that Jerome could see the hurt in her face. And he knew that he was the cause.

"I'm sorry, I don't know what came over me." Mara shook her head.

" You know what Jerome? I don't fucking believe you. I don't believe a word that's coming out of your mouth right now, you know exactly what came over you. You better spill." Jerome jerked back. Had Mara just said the word "fuck"? That didn't happen, Mara didn't say things like that. Mara never said the word fuck. In all the times he had known her the strongest word she had ever said was crap. And that happened so rarely.

He studied her face.

"Okay, I knew Rufus." Mara shook her head,

"Jerome, he had to be like a hundred years old, that's not possible." Jerome opened his mouth but no words came out.

"Oh, it's possible." Came a voice from the bushes.


	10. In Which Mara Learns The Truth

Yes, it's been months, I'm sorry. But here's the next chapter! For all the hardcore JARA fans, and I know that's hard to come by this days, apparently Joyrome is the new thing. On to the story!

**Disclaimer: Yeah, no.**

Patricia stepped confidently out from the bushes, tight lace tights and combat boots, she looked every bit the rebel. But her face betrayed her; dead serious.

"Patricia." Jerome said warningly, this wasn't the way he wanted Mara to find out.

"Oh, do you not want me to tell her the danger you're dragging a perfectly innocent girl into?" Patricia asked sternly.

"Patricia!" He begged. The blue of his eyes looked like tears as he begged.

"No, I will not allow you to bring someone into this who doesn't need to be, how dare you think that you have the authority to do this! You're not even in SIBUNA!" Her voice rose as she spoke.

"Hey, this is none of your business, Trixie! This doesn't have anything to do with your little club!"

"This is Mara we're talking about, you're putting her in totally unnecessary danger!" Patricia was in full protective mode, her auburn hair looked fiery to match her tone, her expression was one of righteousness and anger.

"Because I felt like it, you don't own everything to do with mystery you know!" Jerome had drawn himself up to his full height, and he was trembling with rage. Both Patricia and Jerome knew what Rufus could do, they had both been taken and held for days. Both had experienced unspeakable horrors, but it didn't have to do with this argument!

"She was free of this! She wasn't in danger!" Patricia cried.

"No she was just ignorant, but she's always in danger, as long as it's happening she's—"

Patricia cut him off, "Of course she is but—"

It degenerated into senseless noise for Mara, arguing about her. But she could feel the anger mounting.

"DOESN'T ANYONE WANT TO KNOW WHAT I THINK?" She broke in, pulling the two apart.

"Mara, you don't know what we're talking about," The two chorused. Patricia said it snarkily, but Jerome angered her more, he said it so kindly. He said it so condescendingly. How dare he look down at her like that? It didn't help how his blue eyes sparkled and how cute he looked as he said it.

"Well, you had better tell me then won't you?" she retorted "I'm done with this, stop looking at me like I'm so adorable when I ask about Rufus," they flinched, "stop telling me that I don't know what I'm dealing with, or that it's too dangerous. I'm already in it."

They had the grace to look ashamed, but both were hesitant to tell Mara of the horrors that she may face.

"Rufus was the PI I was talking about first term," Patricia began, "I thought his name was Rene back then…"

Patricia told her experiences with Rufus, glossing over the kidnapping and telling abridged versions of the things that he had said to her. But Patricia told her about the house and it's powers. Mara didn't know if she believed her or not.

Jerome told his version of the story, but he didn't bother to make the story of his kidnapping shorter or sweeter for Mara, not when she had been complaining about condescension. The way he told it was brutally honest. And though Mara was disturbed, she appreciated the effort.

"So, you're telling me that Rufus is a ninety year old man born to protect a woman who, because of some cosmic coincidences is the protector of the world, however, he looks like he's forty and turned evil with lust for eternal life?"

"Essentially." Patricia conceded.

"Alright, but by knowing this, I don't see how I'm in any more danger."

"That's what I was saying!" Jerome said triumphantly.

"Then why didn't you say anything earlier?" She asked pointedly. Jerome looked at the ground.

Mara marched back to the house, ignoring everything that Jerome and Patricia said to apologize she ran up the stairs to her room, slamming the door in their sorry faces.

She sat on her bed with a thump, let her hair loose and shook. She trembled with the weight that had just been put on her. It felt like her back was being walked on by someone who weighed more than the moon. Ironically, it was the fact that they thought she couldn't handle it that weighed on her most.

She hated this, she was small and sweet and smart, but she was just as tough as Patricia or Jerome. It scared her, she wondered if Jerome thought of her as powerful. She wondered if anyone thought of her as powerful.

Four knocks rang out against the door.

"What do you want?" She yelled.

"It's Alfie, Trudy just sent me up to-to tell you that dinner was ready," came the scared response.

"Crap, I'm sorry Alfie, I thought you were-"

"Jerome?" He said quietly, "yeah, I know, can I come in?"

"Sure," she pulled her hair back into a ponytail.

Alfie walked in slowly, cautiously, he walked up and sat next to her. He ran his hand over his forehead, as though there was hair.

"Are you mad that he didn't tell you? About SIBUNA I mean?" Mara shook her head.

"I just want someone to think that I can handle myself, I just wished he could do that."

"You know, I found out about SIBUNA first, before Jerome anyway, but he still tried to get me out of it, He doesn't like anyone to be in danger when he can stop it."

"Then why did he do this? He brought me into dangerous situations before, why are you qualified to deal with this when I'm not?"

"He couldn't stop me. And he knew that, I don't think he knows that about you." Alfie got up, "Let's go, it's time for food! I hope the aliens haven't gotten to it yet."

Mara smiled, "That's the Dalek's secret plan of course, poison the food."

"EXTERMINATE!" Alfie screamed and ran down the stairs.

Mara avoided the SIBUNA's gaze, which was hard to do as they were quite literally two-thirds of the dinner guests. And though she had loved Mick, he and Joy's conversation about health foods was far from scintillating.

She stared at her plate.

"Mara, you know, I um, we could talk." Jerome said awkwardly.

"Mm." Mara murmured.

"Please." Jerome whispered.


	11. In Which Mara Feels Trapped

**Really angsty, and not really advancing the plot. Sorry if you were expecting a really intense dialogue, that's not really possible for me right now. Lots of things have been happening for me right now, some guy things and ugh. So Mara's getting a bit angsty this chapter.**

**Disclaimer: Hehe, you think I own this show, silly readers.**

Mara remembered that she had wanted to be Alice when she was younger, Alice could bumble around in Wonderland all she wanted. She could cry quite the literal sea of tears and drown the world. But it was more than that, she had all of Wonderland. Mara was bound to the land she was born in, and the people that she knew.

Mara used to love to paint, but she had painted herself into a corner, and she knew it. The books, the grades, there wasn't a doubt about it, she had become Obsessed, and by being Obsessed, she had become Obsessive. The adventure meant everything. Jerome had started to mean more to her than he logically should, than he deserved. But she couldn't stop. He hadn't earned this from her, when they were working with his father, he had shown emotion, passion, for _him._ But for her? Never for her.

That's all she wanted, a little passion, a little openness. She had only had a taste, but she was an addict. She had agreed to talk after dinner, she had agreed whole-heartedly that they should resolve this. But she knew what it would come to in the end; he would say that he was sorry and that he was wrong to believe this of her, and she would accept and they would hug, awkwardly. It happened and she should be happy that it was resolved. But it wasn't and she couldn't fix it.

The fact was that there were times when she didn't like him. Really didn't like him, and she had dated Mick and she hadn't liked him either. But she did like him, in the high school sense of the word. But it couldn't work and she knew that.

She was sitting alone in her room, her hair was a messy dark mass of curls, her uniform still impeccable, accepting the tie, which she had knocked askew. There was no one there, but she was still ashamed to cry.

If she let this carry out, there was no freedom left for her. She was bound to a relationship. She only wanted to be Alice, Dorothy, Luna, Ruby Tuesday, Pippi. She couldn't do this. But was she cruel to let it go on? Was it cruel to enjoy it?

She wanted to be with him, she wanted him to hold her close and whisper sweet everythings in her ear. But she couldn't be what she was sure she needed to be.

Did she have to be?

Could he be what she expected? Did he want to be?

None of it made sense anymore. Not one bit of it. But she would continue on in this mad adventure, it would be the best time of her life, she knew. It would be dangerous and bitter and sweet and sour all at once, she would fall and fly and love and hate. But would he? Would she cause him to feel these crazy emotions that he wanted her to feel? Because she couldn't possibly tell, and he wouldn't tell her.

But that was it, and it was life. She hoped to god that she would find a balance. She hoped that she could find her freedom.

**Sorry, bit short. But I like it, and I'm trying to update more.**


	12. In Which It All Goes

Jerome stared at the ceiling for a long time that night. Alfie had told him what Mara said. He knew the way that she felt. Or at least he thought that he did. He knew what he felt.

He missed everything. He missed normal conversation and flirting loudly and obnoxiously, just because he could. He missed joking with Patricia and knowing that it was a joke, instead of assuming, hoping that her hurtful words were in jest.

He should be grateful, that's what they had always told him. You're a rich, white boy in one of the best boarding schools in England, be grateful.

But he couldn't help feeling like it had all gone to shit.

The adventure had been fun, Mara had trusted him and worked with him. He had thought that she was happy. But then it was danger and anger and Patricia and screaming. And now it was different, and he couldn't ever get it back. Everything that he loved left him eventually, and he could never get it back.

God, it's all gone to shit.


End file.
